Kenzaburo Oe: A Writer Who Explored New Ethics While Bearing the Contradictions of Postwar Democracy, 1950s-1990s

Kenzaburo Oe: A Writer Who Explored New Ethics While Bearing the Contradictions of Postwar Democracy, 1950s-1990s
Oe Kenzaburo (1935-2023) was one of the deepest writers to take on the ideological and literary challenges of postwar Japan, and he continued to confront the core issues of contemporary society, including nuclear weapons, peace, war responsibility, the lives of the disabled, and community ethics. The late 1950s, when Oe first appeared on the scene, was a time of rapid economic growth after the end of the Occupation, when postwar democracy was being consolidated as an institution, and when Japan was moving toward a consumer society without an adequate summary of its war experience. The young Oe sensed the ethical vacuum left by this immature democracy and depicted the damaged individual and the possibility of rebirth in his works.

In his early works, Oe's ambiguity of responsibility for the war, the stagnation of rural areas, and the ethical turmoil of youth were expressed, and he was positioned as an artist who spoke out against society against the backdrop of the political tensions of the 1950s and 1960s, including the Security Treaty struggle and student movements. After the birth of his first son, Hikaru, the central themes of his literature became the acceptance of weakness and the ethics of community, and he linked individual weakness and social responsibility through his personal experiences and the football game of the first year of the Man'yō era.

In the 1980s and 1990s, his interest in nuclear weapons and peace issues intensified, and he created a mythical world in which local communities and the threat of nuclear weapons were combined, and his dialogue with the hibakusha in Hiroshima had a profound influence on his thought. At the heart of Oe's literature are the ethics of living with weakness, resistance to violence, and the rebirth of community, a spiritual and historical legacy that reflects the multiple layers of anxiety and hope in postwar society.